Mapping the desert.

Google hit on a low-tech solution. After giving us robot cars and internet-enabled glasses – Google hit on a low-tech solution. To create a “Street View” of a desert, it hired a camel.

The animal, Raffia, has become the first animal to carry Google’s Trekker camera to capture Abu Dhabi landscape, which is typically hoisted by humans to capture 360-degree images of destinations inaccessible to its Street View cars.

Raffia and her guide took to the sand as early as 6am in the morning to ensure the best lighting conditions. The resulting film and still photographs show the desert’s rolling sand dunes, an oasis, fellow camels, scuttling sand and some gangly camera-and-camel shadows.
The Liwa desert meanwhile, is one of the oldest sites and is the historical home of the Nahyan family, the original leaders of the Abu Dhabi emirate. The Liwa Oasis is the largest oasis in the Arabian Peninsula and the location for many Bedouin settlements.

Google Street View has been a feature of Google Maps since 2007. While most images are captured with the Trekker by car, the camera has also been attached to people.

Street View Treks have previously explored sites including the Grand Canyon, Mount Everest, the Eiffel Tower, the Egyptian pyramids and the complexes of temples around Angkor Wat in Cambodia. There’s even an subaquatic Trek of waters around the Galapagos islands.

We want obviously all countries, because there is so much history and culture and heritage. The world becomes accessible from your computer. I think its awesome!